


River Maybe

by der_tanzer



Category: Firefly
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-18
Updated: 2014-03-18
Packaged: 2018-01-16 06:09:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1334899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/der_tanzer/pseuds/der_tanzer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jayne never knows what River means.</p>
            </blockquote>





	River Maybe

“You promised.”

“I know. I won’t.”

“You _promised_.”

“I _won’t_.”

“Ever.”

“Never.”

She laid her head against his chest and seemed to sleep. But he didn’t believe her any more than she believed him. River never really slept, he didn’t think. And Jayne didn’t keep his promises.

He shifted against the rock, cold and hard at his back. He’d wanted River behind him, between him and the rock where he could trap her if she decided to run, and shelter her from the wind if she didn’t. 

River had refused to be trapped.

“They’re coming,” she whispered.

“No they ain’t.” He covered the side of her head with his massive hand and tucked it back into his shoulder. “No one’s out there, girl, and anyway, I promised. Now shut up.”

“Something’s always out there.”

For maybe the first time in his adult life Jayne wished he was packing just a little less weaponry. It wouldn’t have killed him to bring one less knife and use the loop or sheath or boot pouch or belt, or something for a light. Well, _probably_ it wouldn’t have killed him. He did go through a lot of knives this trip.

They were way out of town now, though. It was safe here, hidden in the rocks. If he could just keep the girl from taking off again… Unconsciously he tightened his arms and she gasped, that frightened child sound he hated so much. Aboard ship it was unnerving. Out here in the middle of frig-all it made him squeeze her again and tell her to hush.

“I’m lost.”

“You’re always lost. Now _hush_.”

The moon traveled across the sky. Stars winked in and out. Jayne slept. Maybe River slept too. He didn’t know. Maybe she didn’t, either. He’d found that the number of things River Tam knew was exceeded only by the things she didn’t know. Which was true of everyone, ‘cept in River’s case all those things were the exact opposite of what they should be. Like her probably knowing that what he wanted more than anything was to leave her here and start looking for the ship, but not knowing from one minute to the next if she was awake or not.

Worse still, she probably knew what he was thinking in her sleep. It was just damned unsettling, all of it. Even when she shoved her scrawny leg between his knees, seeking warmth and security, he didn’t know if she knew it. He held her closer, pulled his heavy coat tighter around her small body, and wished mightily he was anywhere but here right now. Or even here with anyone else. Inara, for instance. _She_ could keep him warm.

“They’re coming.”

“Shut your fool head.”

“Think they’d come for you?”

Jayne shivered and River snuggled like a puppy. He felt her laughing. She stopped when he threw his leg across her body and dragged her into an unbreakable grip. She might’ve gone for his stones then, but chose to be puppy again instead.

The moon traveled. The stars winked. Jayne slept. River was a maybe.

River was always a maybe.

“I’m hungry.”

“Who ain’t?”

“You have food.”

There was no point in arguing with a mind-reader. Jayne pulled a protein bar from his coat and let her slobber it on his shirt. She was just like having a gorram dog. That could kill with its brain.

River giggled and Jayne tried to make his mind go blank. The rocks were getting colder. Everything was colder. Everything except River, who was probably sucking all the heat from the air around them. No telling what kind of crazy things she could do that they just hadn’t found out about yet.

“Too bad no one likes you.”

“I got a damn sight more friends’n you do,” he growled. She giggled again and he wished he could hit her. He’d got away with that once. 

Sort of. 

After she slashed him with a butcher knife. 

Maybe he didn’t have any friends.

Maybe they _were_ coming.

The moon. The stars. Jayne. Maybe River.

Always maybe.

The rain fell harder. He pulled the coat up over her head and got wet. The dirt beneath them turned to mud and he rolled on his back, lying in the deepening puddle so she could curl on his chest, a warm, dry puppy under his coat. Jayne hated her in a way he’d never hated anyone he wasn't allowed to kill. She burrowed under his shirt and he hugged her close; like she was cargo; like she was a job.

“They’re coming.”

Jayne didn’t bother telling her to shut up. That was all she ever said anyway. Making him paranoid was what she was doing. On purpose, too. He gave her the food, the coat, the one spot out here that wasn’t gorram ruttin’ mud, and all she wanted to do was talk in creepy-ass riddles about how about-to-be-dead he was.

God, he hated her.

“They’ll know what you did.”

Okay, sometimes she did say other stuff. It didn’t help any, though.

“Shut up.”

Moon. Stars. Jayne. River.

Maybe.

Sunrise.

“Well, ain’t this a sight.”

Jayne had a knife in one hand and a gun in the other, wide awake before he remembered. River still stuck to his chest. And his back still stuck in the mud. He was only prepared for this in his mind, and not even completely there. Jayne had rarely been this ill-prepared.

River laughed.

“Jesus, Mal, I thought you was them marauders finally tracked us down.”

“What, the great Jayne Cobb get tracked? How could you even conjure such a thing?”

“Told him,” River said, rising gracefully from beneath his coat, stepping lightly off his body and into the mud. She seemed to walk on top of it somehow.

“Told him what, lil’ miss?”

“You were coming. I told him over and over. He never believes. He has no faith.”

“No, I don’t reckon he does. Come on, Jayne, get your lazy ass up. We got places to go, marauders to evade.”

Jayne pulled himself up out of the mud, grumbling at the weight of his wet coat and the sucking mud on his boots. Mal and Zoe laughed. River ran ahead, knowing where the ship was though it hadn’t been there last night.

“I’m proud of you, Jayne,” Zoe said, still laughing. “Simon was sure one of you would be in need of doctoring, all this time out here alone. He wasn’t sure if he was going to have to stitch his sister back together or give her a stern talking to about not killing heartless mercenaries.”

“I wasn’t gonna let nothing happen to her,” Jayne said shortly and walked away, following River back to the ship, tracking her as he had tracked her last night when she spooked and ran out into the storm. Maybe she had a point, he considered, glancing at the shallow impressions of her toes in the mud, water standing in the balls of her feet. Maybe he should try having a little faith in his friends.

Or just stick close to one he knew for sure they would always come for.


End file.
